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The latest movie theater news and updates
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July 4, 2011
Happy Independence Day!
Just wanted to wish all of our US users a Happy Independence Day! After you’re done grilling meat in the scorching heat, cool off by patronizing your local movie theater. Air conditioning, entertainment, and a cold drink is the right way to celebrate your freedom (from work!).
Happy July 4th to our CT users around the world!
(Thanks to Camera Slayer for the terrific image.)
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Theatre Historical Society Announces Awards
ELMHURST, IL — The Theatre Historical Society of America has announced its annual member and publications awards. Included is an award to filmmaker Michael Moore for leading the effort to restore the State Theatre in Traverse City, MI “and for creating a business model that is being used to return historic small town theaters to use and vitality all across Michigan.”
Additional awards included “Honorary Member of the Year” to Dr. Sam & Patty Shaheen “who personally contributed almost $8 million to save and renovate the Temple Theatre in Saginaw, MI” and to two authors for the “Outstanding Book of the Year”: Larry Widen for “Milwaukee Movie Theaters” and Cezar DelValle for Volume I and Volume II of the “Brooklyn Theatre Index.”
If you have not yet become a member of the Theatre Historical Society of America, we urge you to do so and help support this terrific and important organization.
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Recommendation from THSA: Kalamazoo State Theatre Virtual Tour
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Weekend box office
Transformers: Dark of the Moon $97.4M Cars 2 $25.1M Bad Teacher $14.1M Larry Crowne $13M Monte Carlo $7.6M -
July 3, 2011
Former Senator Theatre Owner Tom Kiefaber Goes to City Hall
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Photostream of the Week: Lauren Durbin
Looking for an amazing set of images from one of our most talented photographers? Look no further than the collection of images uploaded by Cinema Treasures user Lauren Durbin.
This is simply an amazing collection of photographs of theaters throughout the United States. Bookmark her photo page and come back to it often. Thanks Lauren for the amazing work and for sharing it with the CT community!
We’ll be showcasing more user galleries in the weeks to come…
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July 2, 2011
Why Banking on Young Males Ain’t Workin'
Listen up Hollywood (and film buyers): banking on under 25-year-old males ain’t working this year. As Yahoo! Movies reports, the superhero genre is foundering as young males begin avoiding the movie house.
Here’s the key takeaway from Daniel Frankel’s article:
“Perhaps no other genre has been as affected by the sharp decline in consumption by what has been traditionally the most active moviegoing demographic — men under 25. For ‘Green Lantern,’ for example, men accounted for 64 percent of the opening-weekend audience, but only 37 percent of the audience was under the age of 25. For ‘X-Men: First Class,’ only 46 percent of the audience was under 25; for ‘Thor,’ it was only 28 percent.”
Despite the enormous success of “Bridesmaids” and other films targeted to women — and those over 25 — the same films and sequels are continuing to be green lit:
“‘It’s a huge problem,’ said one studio distribution executive, referring to the flight of younger males from the multiplex. ‘I keep banging the drum about it to anyone on the lot who will listen to me.'”
My take? Men (and boys) under the age of 25 are not wedded to the movie theater experience like those above 25 (and certainly those above 45). They watch movies — if they do — in the family car, on their laptops, and through physical and digital media on HDTVs. In addition, they are often avid video game players, TV viewers, media producers, bloggers, texters, and involved in a million and one other digital and analog activities.
Hollywood used to produce more movies for women because they often dragged along male friends, boy friends, and husbands with them. This doesn’t always work as well in reverse.
The real culprit here is what Frankel doesn’t report: that domestic box office isn’t where the money for a film is made. That comes in licensing the film for TV, cable TV, VOD, international TV, digital distribution, and, more importantly, consumer products. “Cars” (2006), for instance, generated $10 billion in licensed merchandise sales between 2006 and 2011. Superhero movies, like animated films, are “toyetic”—they lend themselves to licensing and merchandising deals that work best for video games, t-shirts, action figures, happy meals, and the rest.
As long as merchandising is more important to media conglomerates than box office, the industry will continue to focus on the 5-25 year-old-male and the films they believe “he” will want. Sorry boomers: you’ll have to be happy with the occasional Woody Allen or foreign film to remind you of a time when moviegoing meant seeing a film in which narrative trumped spectacle.
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Historic Tijuana Movie Palace Gets $3 Million Renovation
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July 1, 2011
Demolition Begins on Brisbane’s Regent Theatre
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David Poland Blogs about Memorable Moviegoing Experiences; Come for the David, stay for the many user comments and memories that follow